If we remove (eg) the competitive grant system, will researchers slack off?
I’ll bet some would and some wouldn’t. See Einstein and how he was working on relativity (at least at the beginning).
If this trait is genetically detectable, it would presumably be a selection criteria for MSI-1. If it is based on nurture, presumably the necessary conditions would be part of the indoctrination for MSI-1. Finally, if it cannot be anticipated, presumably MSI-1 would use post-facto selection (i.e., raise and train more than 10k candidates, keep those that “work” and let the others do other stuff.)
Also, there are likely other motivational elements that would work in a MSI-1 (at least in my view, the selection and training and indoctrination implicit in the OP’s suggestion would be very different from any group I am aware of in history). And stuff like peer recognition and the satisfaction of a job well done are huge motivators in some cultures.
Also, remember we’re seeing this with culture-tinted glasses: In the west pretty much everyone is focused on a carreer, family and the like; the few who aren’t are seen as “slackers”, “hippies”, “weirdos” etc. Even if not subscribing to that cultural subtext rationally, it’s hard to prevent the unconscious associations of “no care for money=status” => “no motivation”.
I'm skeptical about trying to build FAI, but not about trying to influence the Singularity in a positive direction. Some people may be skeptical even of the latter because they don't think the possibility of an intelligence explosion is a very likely one. I suggest that even if intelligence explosion turns out to be impossible, we can still reach a positive Singularity by building what I'll call "modest superintelligences", that is, superintelligent entities, capable of taking over the universe and preventing existential risks and Malthusian outcomes, whose construction does not require fast recursive self-improvement or other questionable assumptions about the nature of intelligence. This helps to establish a lower bound on the benefits of an organization that aims to strategically influence the outcome of the Singularity.
(To recall what the actual von Neumann, who we might call MSI-0, accomplished, open his Wikipedia page and scroll through the "known for" sidebar.)
Building a MSI-1 seems to require a total cost on the order of $100 billion (assuming $10 million for each clone), which is comparable to the Apollo project, and about 0.25% of the annual Gross World Product. (For further comparison, note that Apple has a market capitalization of $561 billion, and annual profit of $25 billion.) In exchange for that cost, any nation that undertakes the project has a reasonable chance of obtaining an insurmountable lead in whatever technologies end up driving the Singularity, and with that a large measure of control over its outcome. If no better strategic options come along, lobbying a government to build MSI-1 and/or influencing its design and aims seems to be the least that a Singularitarian organization could do.